Former NFL player and Heisman Trophy winner, Reggie Bush had some strong words about the NCAA’s support of a player endorsement plan.
Bush said that paying college athletes for their names and likenesses is “going to destroy some people.”
Bush, a former star at USC, discussed paying college athletes during a recent interview with Playboy.
“Guidance is the one thing that young athletes coming through the college system miss on so much,” Bush told Playboy.
“I missed on it. They’re about to start paying college athletes. This is something that has never been experienced before, and it’s going to destroy some people if their foundation is not in the right place.”
Last month, the NCAA announced its support of allowing athletes to sign endorsement contracts and receive payment for other work.
However, the schools they attend must not be involved in any of the payments.
The NCAA says athletes will be allowed to appear in advertisements and can reference their sport and school, but they would not be able to use school logos or branding in those advertisements.
“The one thing I wish I had early in my career is proper financial knowledge,” Bush said. “I hired good agents, and I hired a good team. But I allowed that good team to make decisions for me. I’m not saying I’m going bankrupt, but if I had the proper knowledge back then, some things would be different.
A formal proposal for the new rules will be submitted no later than October to the NCAA board. They will vote on the proposal no later than January 2021.
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“People just assume, ‘Well, you got all this money, so you’re good.’ It’s actually the opposite. The more money you have, the more danger you’re in, because now you’re a freaking open target for a lot of people. It’s a nasty world out there, and it’s about to get nastier. You’re going to really start to see the true colors of a lot of people, and a lot of businesses too. You’re going to see people doing some crazy stuff to make money, because our market is crashing.”
Bush, 35, was a two-time All-America running back at USC and helped the Trojans win back-to-back national titles in 2003 and 2004.
He won the Heisman as a junior in 2005 but decided to forfeit the award in 2010. The NCAA concluded that Bush and his family improperly accepted cash and gifts from sports agents while playing at USC.
Bush retired from football in 2017 after an 11-year NFL career.